Friday, 12 December 2014

I enjoy testing out theories. This one is about plied threads having a sort of up and down; up and they behave themselves, down and they twirl and twist, squiggle and wriggle, tie themselves into ungainly knots and, generally, misbehave.

I wonder if you stitchers out there have similar "thread lore" that you've been told or have tested

So, a piece of lovely Ed Mar rayon in purple and pink - not being tested on this fabric, that already belongs to a cushion, but at the edge of something.

I've threaded each end, and will cut and stitch to see how each behaves.

Same needle, same bit of fabric,

and quite a squiggly wiggle on the right

though subsequent stitches didn't behave the same way, however

the red thread, coming from the left, has untwisted quite a lot at the end, compared to the purple one

and look at how that stem stitch sits in opposite directions, though placed into the fabric in exactly the same way. The purple thread, which squiggled but didn't unravel sits above the line, the red, which squiggled less, sits below. Food for thought.

Friday, 5 December 2014

I took out these distracting open chain stitches in dark blue and purple - I am learning the value of unpicking and persevering. These were originally done to explore creating a cell like pattern to sit above the organza for the dragonfly project, which is simply in abeyance at the moment, not forgotten

it has evolved into something else, a counter-play between the surface and what lies beneath. Now I'm focusing here in the top left corner. Just an echo of the wave pattern picked up from the fabric below. I need to do something to hold down the organza at the top left. Something delicate that doesn't draw the eye away from the orange wave. So I'm looking at the threads I've got

Absolutely wrong, too pale and shiny though it has been used elsewhere

A good purple, but too fat and shiny, again it will draw the eye too much.

Lovely colours, and the right weight, but might tucking bright orange up here be a bit distracting, in this quiet space?

But here, the colours of the organza are echoed closely, the weight is right, and it's a matte thread so won't draw the eye, just blend gently I hope. I'm also looking to break the edge at the side by bringing the flow out onto the ground fabric so it softens that line of blue on the left.

And for an interesting change of scale and tone, I have a Studio 11 next week so also need to consider these - not sure if this will become something functional or decorative, but I love the patterns created by the breakdown process shown in video by Clare Benn and Leslie Morgan

The family of fabrics I've dyed to go with the printed fabric - resist screen printed at the top, embedded screen printed at the bottom. I'm rather pleased with them.